Ruth from Makey-Cakey
was our March 2013 Daring Bakers’ challenge host. She encouraged us all
to get experimental in the kitchen and sneak some hidden veggies into
our baking, with surprising and delicious results!

I kind of opted out on the challenge this month - in part because I've done my fair share of hiding vegetables in baked goods. Instead of making something new, I have quite a few successful experiments that I'll list here for you.

For example:

Beet Cake. This was de-gluten-free-ified from one of my favorite local bakers, Annie Wegner-LeFort. It was also a hit with my son, who would never touch a beet if prepared traditionally. Click the photo for the recipe (and a link to the original, gluten-free recipe) on flickr.

Hidden Veg Muffins. There is pureed carrot in here, and some banana, making for a muffin with very little refined sugar. For some reason, my kid will not eat carrots - but I try and sneak them in where I can, and this is one place where they went undetected. Recipe is also linked to the photo on flickr.

And speaking of muffins, these Sweet Potato Muffins went over well at my house as well. A whole cup of sweet potato puree in these!

I mentioned in the notes for these Vegan Zucchini Carrot Muffins (also posted on flickr), that the world really doesn't need another muffin recipe - but that sometimes a good muffin recipe is hard to find. I've made these several times - and they are deliciously able to hide about 2 cups of shredded vegetables and keep them hidden from suspecting children.

On a more desserty note, I had tinkered for some time with black bean brownies. I probably haven't made them again in the 3 years since I wrote about them, but they were good, and vegan to boot. I do highly recommend whipped cream with cayenne pepper though, which is what made these brownies not truly vegan.Deena's Chocolate Zucchini Cake is probably one of my most favorite cakes ever - if you don't include her Honey Cake. So much of what Deena writes sticks like glue in my head. The opening of her post on this worthy cake says: "My friend's husband once left her a note in the kitchen that read: Honey, we're out of bundt cake." I always think of this when I want to make a bundt cake, because I grew up in a bundt cake-eating family, and I long to hear (or see) these words lingering around a bundt in my own house. My Husband is not so much a sweets eater, so I live vicariously through these words - and I make this bundt cake in the height of zucchini season when I have friends for supper. Perhaps when my kids grow big enough to leave me notes, I'll be as lucky as Deena's friend...

Since adding copious amounts of shredded vegetables to cake is usually always a good idea, I took Susan from Wild Yeast's lead and made a cake with a whole lot of shredded parsnip. The original cake was made with carrots, and it too is one of my favorites. I try to leave myself a supply of sourdough ends to dry and grind up, just so I have the ability to make it on a whim, since there is no flour in this recipe - only dried bread crumbs! I wonder how this cake would fare with well-drained zucchini?

Most recently, I made these Carrot-Banana Muffins, which were devoid of refined sugar and gluten. In my opinion, they are the perfect near-dessert muffin - and they really satisfy a sweet tooth. And we all know that I have a whole mouth full of those that I'm trying to deal with.

Hopefully, I'll be bake to my Daring self next month and able to concoct something new and exciting. But I'm glad I had a chance to think back on all of the ways I've been successfully able to hide vegetables in the baked goods here at my house. Be sure to check the Daring Baker blogroll and website for more inspiration!

Currently Reading...

Photo.

This is probably the most common sight around my table. My mantra, “if in doubt, make tacos”, is indelible writing on my soul. I’ve got to get around to asking @thesteelfarmer if they can repair my cast iron plancha that I cracked. I’m still using it imperfect, but I think about it every time I make tortillas. (Basically I think about it at least once or twice a week.). #tacosporvida #tacos #fridaynight #realfood #homecook

I got 7 boxes of books packed tonight, after deciding not to be overwhelmed standing in front of the first bookcase, acting like 45 days in a box was somehow going to separate me forever from those friends. I actually hadn’t held my 1972 Webster dictionary in quite some time, and it felt familiar and weighty. Classic in denim blue and gilded in gold, I wonder what words are in there that have somehow gone out of style with newer editions. I found a 1929 copy of Enough Rope by Dorothy Parker, and spent a quarter hour leafing through it, taking note of how someone had checked key poems. Coincidence? Maybe not. And a drawing of an eye twenty years old, on a post-it as a bookmark. Careful eyes may note the long strands of hair likely belonging to the girl who left it for me. (She recalled drawing it, but I felt like it was the first time I’d seen it, strange because I do have a good memory. It makes me wonder what else I’ve forgotten that collected books might reveal to me...) #packingbooks #books #dictionary #merriamwebster #dorothyparker

Workday bake. I always think I won’t be excited about a new loaf, but fortunately that experience has yet to hit me. Each one is like a new living thing, come to take up residence for a week. Let my epitaph be “if you have bread, you have dinner.” #bake #sourdough #bread #progluten #wildyeast #breadscoring #acaseofthetuesdays

I don’t come from a family that has photos all over our walls. There are a few, carefully placed, on my parent’s’ walls - mostly taken after grandchildren happened and babies and school pictures started creeping in. Our senior pictures hiding in cabinets, there if you’re really looking. Black and whites of grandparents lurking, but not obvious. Most of us are camera shy and that’s okay. I was so full of happiness at the sight of my family yesterday that I could barely stand it. And even happier that we were all enjoying the moment so much that nobody even took out a phone once and snapped a picture as proof. These memories, made the old-fashioned way, tend to linger in the brain pan the way fleeting social media pictures could never dream to do. Today before I had to drive back my mom lifted down the copy of the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook that she got (I think) as a wedding gift 45 years ago to show me a white cake recipe that she’d made recently that I tasted and loved. We didn’t have Joy growing up, we had this all-encompassing tome instead. My mom and I talked casually about the recipe and pictures in this book, how both of us have always wanted to make or even just eat petit fours, and how neither of us ever have made or eaten them. After she left the kitchen to get ready for church, I realized that I wouldn’t have a picture of my mother today, but I have this book and thousands of conversations. My whole lifetime of advice and the search for the best white cake recipes to embed in my memory. That all the beauty and generosity, the practicality and steadfastness my mom has, can be held in my hands if I want. My memory holds such a clear picture, and it won’t ever fade. #mothersday #betterhomesandgardens #homecook

I maybe omitted that when I made the Lillet spiked sabayon for @the_bojon_gourmet’s trifle I served at Easter, the first batch was cooked over a rigged situation that wasn’t ideal and I got water in the custard. I was so upset. So I separated another 8 eggs and began again with a better rigged situation. I froze the questionable sabayon, figuring that it was nothing if not exceptional ice cream base. I added heavy cream, and mixed toasted pecans. It’s ridiculously rich. It’s a velvet lounge coat that very nearly warms you up as you eat. 😍 #icecream #homemade #wastenotwantnot #glutenfree #frozencustard #wiscogirl